A technology for simulating a transmission line by using an I/O Buffer Information Specification (IBIS) model describing electric characteristics such as an input or output of a semiconductor component has been put into practice.
A user verifies an action of a semiconductor component by observing a waveform of a signal propagated through a transmission line obtained by a transmission line simulation. Examples of the semiconductor component include an Integrated Circuit (IC) and a Large-Scale Integration (LSI). The IC or LSI may be a semiconductor memory such as a Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM), a Static Random Access Memory (SRAM), or a flash memory. The IC or LSI may be a Central Processing Unit (CPU), a multicore CPU, a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), or a Programmable Logic Device (PLD).
When there are a plurality of IBIS models for elements having a specification similar to each other, a simulation device simulates a transmission line by using each of the plurality of IBIS models so as to determine waveform quality and obtain delay data. As described above, there is a problem wherein the number of simulations of a transmission line increases as the number of IBIS models increases.
In order to deal with this problem, a technology has been proposed for reducing the number of simulations by generating an IBIS model for verification that includes the characteristics of a plurality of IBIS models and performing simulation using the IBIS model for verification.
A user desires to select an element of an IBIS model having a large margin for evaluation items as an element to be loaded onto a product in order to obtain a produce having fewer malfunctions. However, it is impossible to specify which IBIS model has a large margin only by performing simulation using the IBIS model for verification, and it is difficult to determine which element of the elements of the plurality of IBIS models may be selected.
Further, in simulations using respective IBIS models, as an example, when the first, second, and third IBIS models respectively have the largest margins for the first, second, and third evaluation items, it is difficult to determine which element of the elements of the first, second, and third IBIS models may be selected.
Furthermore, the document such as Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2010-9475 is well known.